


Phantoms

by dirtygsanchez



Series: Pyramid-Scheme [11]
Category: Gravity Falls, Rick and Morty
Genre: Angst, Heartbreak, Loss, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-12
Updated: 2017-05-12
Packaged: 2018-10-31 01:40:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,973
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10889112
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dirtygsanchez/pseuds/dirtygsanchez
Summary: Pyramid-Scheme SeriesThis a turn-about Roleplay fiction originally written on tumblr between @bill-rick (Bill Cipher now inhabiting a Rick Sanchez body) and @evilgsanchez ('Evil' Rick Sanchez). Through roleplay we have built up a 40 year relationship for the pair and this compiled fiction is essentially the amalgamation of two drabbles which detail the drastic steps Bill takes to deal with his spiralling heartache and how Evil Rick assists him with this.





	Phantoms

**Phantoms**

__[Let me sleep](http://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DTOsJasWO_Jc&t=YjhlYTg4ZjkzMDA5NzRlMzEyNzQ4ZWM3ZmNkMGRjMjc4YjcxODk1NSx3RU9Memp6cQ%3D%3D&b=t%3Av3yzHBA2_mkbV6eiXgbyig&p=http%3A%2F%2Fbill-rick.tumblr.com%2Fpost%2F157795458867%2Fphantoms-drabble&m=0)  
I am tired of my grief  
And I would like you  
To love me, to love me, to love me

Sleepy golden eyes were lost in their own reflection on the lens, staring aimlessly at the camera. The red button beckoned him. He just had to press record, take care of it, hand off the video and be rid of this forever… Well, that was the goal, anyway.

Bill hadn’t told Evil Rick where he was going, just that he had to go take care of a few errands and he’d back at their cabin in the evening. He didn’t want it to be a massive affair by any means, even if it would be altering his life as he knew it so profoundly. He figured the best way to take care of this was to quickly, but  _quietly_ , rid himself of all the evidence that the major events of this past year or so had even happened. Because every waking moment he spent thinking about how it had all become so  _fucked_ , how he would never see them again, how he would never be able to fully explain… He never  _got_  to explain, never had any form of closure. It was over within the span of a few minutes. No yelling, no fighting. It came to an end the same way it began- so fast it left him dizzy, blindsided. 

But nothing was left now. The tattoos on his fingers had been covered by thick black bands of ink. The picture frames were replaced. The rings were pawned off- he’d thought about melting the metal down, making some new jewelry with more compartments for poisons and small weapons to carry with him… But even if they had been molded, shaped, bent whichever way, there was still a weight to them he no longer wanted to carry. 

He’d traded the hand-crafted cane from his husband for an expensive, store-bought, sleek and polished black wood model with a gold skull handle. He’d transformed each and every bedroom into how it had been before they walked into his life- sheets changed, clothes incinerated, anything and  _everything_  that carried a story of them with it was gone. Everything but the house itself. His husband, his children, his  _family_  reduced to nothing more than phantoms, old haunts of a prior failed life which he finally had to let go. For their sake.  _For his sake._

And so now, Bill Cipher sat alone, staring at the camera with nothing left to do but wipe it all away for good. He played with the disk in his hands, bold letters written in permanent marker etched across the surface, reading “ _DO NOT WATCH. GIVE TO RICK.”_

Taking a deep breath, he slid the CD into the drive, pressed the record button, and choked out the words.

 _“My name is William Norman Cipher and this evening, at exactly 6:18 p.m. on February 27th, 2017, I have decided to erase my memories of all involvement I had with with my ex-husband and… our family.”_ There was a pause, a moment where the demon looked down at his hands. He would regret this…  _Wouldn’t he?_  Erasing Liam had been one of the biggest mistakes of his life. It had made him  _colder,_ made him  _harder…_ What would he become after this?

No. What was done had been done. There was no turning back now.

“ _I am making this video to give to my partner of the last 40 years for safekeeping… So that if mention of them should arise again I can be reminded that, while they did indeed exist, it was my decision alone to wipe them from my mind. I was not coerced into doing this, hell it wasn’t even suggested I do this I just… I’ve thought about this since I broke things off with my husband… and I’ve realized that I will not move on otherwise. It’s for my own good, so that I do not spend an eternity miserable over this. I will never see them again, and it’s too late to change that.”_

Finally, Cipher’s dulled amber gaze rose to look into the camera once more, tears pricking his eyes and rolling down his cheeks despite how obviously he was trying to hold them back. “ _Ricky, when you watch this I will have no memory of what I just did or why I did it… Or who they were to me. So if I ever try to blame you or anyone else for this… You have this video as proof. That this was solely my choice, that you had nothing to do with this. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before… But it needed to be done. You know how I am… If I let this linger anymore it’ll probably destroy me. And I don’t want to let it poison us… All I ask is that if you disapprove of my decision in any way, that you try to understand. And that you forgive me… I won’t have anyone else to turn to otherwise…”_ He breathed a laugh. “ _And thanks for dealing with my miserable old ass for this long, kiddo… Hopefully after it’s over I’ll be the same old demon you remember. It’ll be better for all of us in the long run, I know it… I love you…”_

Ejecting the CD from the drive, he placed the recording into its case, holding it in his hands as he closed his eyes. 

A year’s worth of memories flashed before him all so rapidly he could hardly keep track. Bright honey gaze faded to an icy blue, and he heard voices which he would hear only this one last time. He heard the laughter of children, mingled voices calling out to him as “ _Dad”._  He saw a little girl no older than ten with eyes that mirrored his own, that resembled pools of sunshine. He saw summer evenings spent out on the front porch with an older gentlemen, his fingers strumming on a guitar. He remembered the fresh cotton scent of sweaters, the heat of the fireplace and the heat of his husband’s skin mingling in the bedroom. And each day, each scent, each voice, each  _memory_  flickered in front of him, from his wedding day to the way the morning light had framed his husband’s face as he slept, was washed away one by one, engulfed by a cold blue flame, disintegrated from his mind piece by piece along with the ache in his ancient black heart. 

But despite the chill it left in his bones and in his chest, the fire burned, it burned so brightly it  _blinded_ him, consuming everything he had known,  _dismantling_  everything he had built over the past year. 

And it burned.

And it burned.

**_And it burned._ **

The master bedroom of the Chicken Point cabin was bathed in yellow light, and stepping forth from the golden portal a confused demon with a mild headache scratched his neck. Why on Earth had he gone back to Gravity Falls again? Probably to feed Vixie. Yes, that’s right. He was relieved to see that in his absence, the raven was faring quite well. Had he gotten drunk? It sure as hell felt like it. Not one of his wiser decisions. He had to stay alert, had to be able to take care of his companion.

The dark cloak of night had already settled over the world, reflections of moonlight dancing upon the black waves on the lake’s surface. Bill glanced over to the bed, smiling to find Rick curled up and sleeping soundly under the usual mountain of quilts and comforters. He looked down at the CD in his hands once more. “ _DO NOT WATCH. GIVE TO RICK,”_ it read. He couldn’t remember  _why_  he had it, but he was too tired to give it much more thought. He could fret over it more in the morning. Right now, he was too preoccupied with the mere idea of curling around Rick, pulling him close and falling asleep. Fuck, he looked comfy.

Carefully, quietly, the demon crawled into bed alongside the love of his life, the  _only_  one he ever had.

 

\--------------------------------------

 

Streams of sunlight cracked through the blinds as the sun rose and Evil Rick’s overly precise body clock slowly roused him. Reaching over to the bedside table he picked up his watch and waited for his vision to clear of his sleep induced haze so he could read the time…7am…on the dot; time to get up. Placing down his watch something shifted under his hand and clattered down to the floor. Easing himself out from under Bill’s arm, he slipped from the bed and stood to stretch out his back with a silent yawn before glancing down at his feet spotting a disk lying on the floor, one with a large inscription scrawled in thick black pen.

_DO NOT WATCH. GIVE TO RICK._

Glancing over at the calm, snoring deep-sleeping demon, his brow furrowed with concern as a sickening nausea began to swirl in his stomach. Before he would allow his mind to suggest, awful, terrible scenarios, he marched through to the lounge, urgently opened up his laptop, sat down at the kitchen table and immediately inserted the disc, holding his breath as he waited for it to play.

_“My name is William Norman Cipher and this evening, at exactly 6:18 p.m. on February 27th, 2017, I have decided to erase my memories of all involvement I had with my ex-husband and… our family.”_

Immediately he paused it, needing a brief moment of silence to let the stark truth of the announcement settle within him. Bill look distraught, worried and utterly broken; the mere sight of his state alone was enough to tell Rick the demon had definitely followed through. Huffing out a tense breath he pressed play and let the footage continue on, watching as the demon explained his intentions and described the meaning for giving him the disk.

_I don’t want to let it poison us…_

_It’ll be better for all of us in the long run, I know it… I love you…_

As the picture faded to black Evil Rick sat in silence, trying to comprehend the sheer magnitude of what Bill had done. How was he supposed to feel about this? He felt so many different things, all at once, in waves, waves that only lead to a strange kind of frantic disjointed confusion. Wasn’t this what he had wanted all along, to have Bill to himself, to rewind time so that he had never met his husband in the first place; to be the only one the demon had ever truly loved? It was true, but not like  _this_ , like this only one of them had been able to rewind while he remained fully embedded in the present; remained the only one with the persistent ache of knowing Bill had both needed and wanted something better for himself and had, to Rick’s detriment, found it. The burden of knowing was now something he was forced to face alone,  _Christ_ , the only other person who had really understood his struggle, now no longer remembered it at all.

Lowering his head into his hands he groaned as his mind became plagued with questions. Would Bill remember why he’d nearly beaten him to death on his lab floor? Remember everything they’d given up to be together? Remember that despite everything, the tense friendship, the marriage, the children,  _he’d_  always been there,  _always_  waiting and ever enduring? He already knew the answer of course, he just didn’t want to admit it to himself; Bill would not remember; once again it was a weight he was going to have to carry on his own,  _no_ , not just carry,  _conceal._

Pushing away from the table with a frustrated moan he walked over to the corner kitchen to make a strong black cup of coffee; after three sips he replaced it with a tall glass of whiskey. Lighting a cigarette he inhaled deeply, by the time he exhaled he finally realised he was being a selfish piece of shit by thinking only about himself. Bill  _needed_  this, they  _needed_  this, the past….well that’s just what it was, the fucking past and that was where it needed to stay; he’d spent too long dwelling on his perceived abandonment, he’d sickened himself with it, felt blinded by it _; poisoned._

He wasn’t sure what steps Bill had taken to perform a full memory removal, something he already had experience with himself. Experience told him that there was always something that escaped ‘the  _cleanse_ ’, in his own case it had been his security tapes, ones he wished he’d never watched. Keen to protect Bill from that kind of confusion and heartache, he drained the last of his whiskey, quickly dressed, ejected the disk and slipped it into his lab coat pocket. Grabbing his portal gun, he entered the co-ordinates for Bill’s woodland cabin, blasted open a shimmering green void and stepped straight through it.

As he emerged on the other side outside the main door of the cabin he was suddenly struck by the fact he hadn’t been inside it in over a year. Hadn’t been  _welcome_ inside it, his mind bitterly and annoyingly interjected. Forcing down the feeling he painstakingly disabled the security locks with his wrist device and ventured inside.

The cabin was exactly how he remembered it, before Bill’s family, before Bill’s marriage, before he’d threatened to burn the place down with Bill’s husband and family in it, something he was admittedly glad Bill would no longer remember. 

In silence he walked from room to room looking for anything that might appear unusual to the demon when he returned. Having checked drawers and cupboards he had found nothing, but when he moved one of the beds he found two petite pink bows, presumably for a little girl’s hair and a child’s crudely drawn crayon-smeared picture of a happy family. The figure in the middle was tall, smiling with glowing yellow eyes; the sight of it alone filled Evil Rick with a thick and suffocating sense of guilt. Slowly running his thumb over the colourful waxy outline of Bill’s face, he hastily folded up the paper, pocketed the bows and marched purposely through into the kitchen. Grabbing a steel pan he walked out onto the porch, thumped it down and filled it with Bourbon from his hip flask, taking a few sharp swigs for himself before dropping in the paper and the tiny pink hair accessories. Lighting a match he dropped it in the pan and stood watching it all burn;  _everything burns;_ Bill was the match and undeniably he himself, had always been the gasoline.

Having disposed of the pulpy ash, he cleaned and replaced the pan then closed the door behind him and stood staring at the cabin as he smoked the last cigarette in his pack. This place, Bill’s home, was a place that had become grotesquely transformed in his mind over the last year from a place of happiness, to a place of hatred, he wondered if he’d ever be able to think of it in the same way again. The realisation was a stark reminder of the reasons Bill had been forced to take such drastic action.

Watching the tall pine trees sway, he shivered as a cold breeze cut through his clothes and rustled the leaves; time to go. Grinding his cigarette out under his heel, he shot open a portal to return back to Chicken Point.

Stepping through into the cabin he immediately hid the disk in amongst his belongings in a place he felt it was unlikely Bill would ever look. He’d considered destroying it but had decided to keep it for the time being knowing there might come a time where only Bill himself could answer the demon’s own questions, if he ever sought to ask them.

In need of a drink, he poured himself another large glass of whiskey and shot it back, hissing air through his teeth as it nicely scalded his throat. Returning to Bill’s cabin had brought forward thoughts of home, of the lair, of his life and of the mess he’d made that he’d been hiding from all this time. Placing down the glass with a thud of conviction, he resolved to return to the lair sometime in the next few days and finally face up to the reality of its empty rooms and cold bed, the reality of losing Rick, a situation for which there was no quick fix, but one that he would fiercely endeavour to fix regardless.

Slowly stepping out of his clothes, he stacked them neatly and placed them on a nearby chair before quietly stalking back through to the bedroom. He stood for a moment, instantly struck by how peaceful the chaotic demon looked, it was the most contented he’d seen Bill look since they’d arrived here and the sight of it was warming. Walking around the bed he gently slipped back under the covers and shifted the sleeping demon over to lie curled against his back. Pulling Bill’s hand over him he looked down at the thick black bands of ink that now covered any sign of Bill’s wedding band and the other tattoos that had represented his husband. Bringing Bill’s hand up to his face, he brushed the back of it against his cheek then nestled it against his chest. Sighing, the old man suddenly realised he was smiling; surprisingly not a small smile either. It had taken him a while to realise it, but as he finally acknowledged the truth he found it to be irrefutable; _this_  was what he had  _always_  wanted; to once again be Bill’s first and  _only_  real love.

\----------------------

**END**

 

**Author's Note:**

> The Pyramid-Scheme threads which follow on from this in the character;s timeline are a work in progress and will be added to the series as we go forward. (This note will be updated to reflect this when the time comes).


End file.
